Ji Jue's remark had plunged the entire workshop into silence.

Not only was Ye Chun stupefied, but even Professor Ye also fell silent for a moment, a hint of shock appearing on her face as though an FPS gamer, who thought himself too clever by half, suddenly encountered a P.S. player.

Could your idea be a bit too urbanized?

"… Your suggestion is indeed wilder than mine," she said with a deep look at Ji Jue. "But where exactly did you pick up this habit of readily resorting to murder and arson?"

"Ah?"

Ji Jue was also taken aback. Wasn't it you who mentioned an eye for an eye, giving Kong Qingyan a taste of her own medicine? But when he thought about it more carefully, Professor Ye hadn't been gesturing at her neck, asking him to take her down… Something wasn't right. Was his tendency and inclination toward moral decline becoming increasingly obvious?

I'm a normal person!

How could I possibly take down anyone who offended me just like that?

Hmm, it seems like anyone who offended me just… got dealt with. Alas, except for Yu Hanguang.

"You're right, I will pay more attention," Ji Jue said apologetically, nodding in shame.

"I'm not blaming you. In fact, I think it's good. At least I don't have to worry about my student being too nice and getting taken advantage of. Your style and preferences are your own business; I don't need to nitpick."

Professor Ye accepted the reality that her student might have antisocial tendencies with calm detachment, ignoring Ji Jue's several attempts to defend himself with his eyes, and then asked:

"What do you think Kong Qingyan is here for this time?"

"Uh…"

Ji Jue pondered for a moment and ventured, "After making sufficient preparations, is she trying to suppress you through the comparison of students?"

"Perhaps that's partly the reason, but it wouldn't suffice for her to make such a fuss and come strutting from Tide City as soon as she heard I had taken a new student. Personal pride and shame would not be the main reason for a mature craftsman's actions, and I hope you remember that."

Professor Ye spoke solemnly: "Alchemy is a precise and complicated discipline. The vast majority of people spend their days researching the finest nuances, and emotional impulses are worn down over time.

As a result, over the long term, craftsmen almost become beings who haggle over every ounce of interest; others, lose sight of priorities, turning into mere merchants who only know how to market.

Kong Qingyan is such a person, valuing honor more than results, and status more than skill. For her, a deal where there's no advantage is not worth doing, and it's not worth the effort for just a slight benefit."

The professor declared emphatically, "She came this time for me."

"Ah?"

Ji Jue's eyes widened in disbelief.

"But if that's the case, there should have been more action. Instead, I almost directly slapped her several times to her face, and yet she didn't dare challenge me.

That means, what is it just to confirm? My condition, or rather the condition of the workshop, or to aim for some results and to realize a certain plan, trying to block out my interference from the start."

As she mused and analyzed to herself, a faint vibration sound emerged.

It came from the mobile phone on the table.

Contact: "Huangji Chen Xingzhou"

When the call was answered, a voice came through, but amidst the built-in interference of the mobile phone, bystanders couldn't hear clearly, only able to glimpse Professor Ye's expression subtly shifting, as though she had a realization.

"So that's how it is, I understand. The final payment will be made within two business days. Pleasure doing business."

After hanging up the phone, Professor Ye fell into contemplation.

As if considering something.

"Perhaps, this is fate."

She suddenly turned to Ji Jue, "How far have you gone with the deconstruction and analysis of Ancient's Mouth?"

"Ah?"

Seeing the topic shift so abruptly, Ji Jue was a bit confused. His first instinct was 'pretty much, got everything figured out,' but after some more careful thought, he felt that 'understood ninety percent' was still an exaggeration.

"Pretty much got half of it figured out…"

He hesitated, not daring to admit that he was completely confused, dazzled by the complexity.

It wasn't just the workload; the difficulty was also far beyond Ji Jue's understanding. All he could do was grope in the dark, repeatedly guessing and ruling out, to confirm the effect and function of each part.

He obediently handed over his notes: "The deconstruction of the main part is pretty much figured out."

In plain terms, he had roughly understood which parts played a role and which seemed fancy but were actually useless.

After Professor Ye took the notes, she put on her glasses and entered judgment mode.

After about ten minutes of correction, she handed the notes back to Ji Jue, who was then stung by the many red crosses and corrections on them.

He had made too many mistakes!

Apart from negating many of Ji Jue's guesses, she had added many aspects that he hadn't imagined at all.

With the experience of a master, she overviewed the manufacturing philosophy of the alchemy work from a higher perspective.

And more importantly…

When she reached out and gripped the Ancient's Mouth necklace, those intricate structures, which seemed like flowers blooming in the fog to Ji Jue, projected and became visible in the air.

In an instant, the entire living room was filled, even the entirety of the living room could not contain it, unable to display the more intricate and fancy details.

This was a complex structure that, when unfolded from within a volume the size of a thumb, could cover more than half of a stadium.

But more often than not, complexity was meaningless, giving the impression of mere showmanship, with a great deal of effort exerted in inexplicable places, sacrificing many functions and structures for aesthetics.

This made Ji Jue, who was used to the cost-effectiveness emphasized from the foundation of modern alchemy, feel extremely uncomfortable, "Are these alchemy craftsmen idle all day?"

"Anything presented to the Emperor is like this, ceremony is everything, it is better to overdo it than to show disrespect. Just for such a tiny thing, it takes a large workshop decades of time and effort.

Yet, the cattle and livestock of that time would feel honored."

Professor Ye's mocking commentary showed no regard for the effort involved.

This kind of effort, spent in meaningless places, was not really effort but the price of vanity, seeking to please authority and show off oneself.

While instructing Ji Jue on the structure of the Ancient's Mouth, waiting for him to finally be able to correctly distinguish the functions and realities of various structures, Professor Ye slowly nodded, "That's enough, to achieve this level in just a few days, I originally estimated that a month's time should be about right, but unfortunately, it seems we may not have that much time now."

With that, her fingers clenched.

The vast projection dissipated without a trace and, following that, a soft shattering sound emanated from the palm of her hand.

In the sudden shock, Ji Jue instinctively leaped up from the sofa, not because he worried about the damage to the Ancient's Mouth, but in that instant, the spiritual fluctuations bursting forth from between Professor Ye's fingers.

So intricate and complex, with frequency changes exceeding microseconds, rising or falling with no discernible pattern, impossible to fathom.

And as she once again spread her fingers, negligible fragments fell from the Ancient's Mouth, turning to dust and sand, yet driving Ji Jue's abilities to the brink of madness.

Drooling with anticipation, hardly able to contain the hunger.

Almost losing control!

In carefully taking over the fragments and items, he pocketed the shards and promptly checked the inner structure of the Ancient's Mouth.

But what he found was that the original structure, once maddeningly complex, had now vanished without a trace.

Those spiritual circuits connected to other fragments and pointless decorative structures, in that brief moment, were effortlessly and completely erased by Professor Ye!

The streamlined structure, now following the principles of modern alchemy, was not even a tenth of its original size, but with the superfluous parts cast aside, efficiency had improved several times over.

All runes and circuits revolved around the central Superior Emblem·Vortex, which preserved the blessing called "Regeneration," bestowing Vortex's Blessing.

Beyond that, all unrelated elements were nowhere to be seen.

"What is this?"

Ji Jue felt as if he were hallucinating.

They say destruction is easy but construction is difficult, yet to preserve and even streamline the core while eliminating unrelated parts, the difficulty is astronomical.

Inconceivable!

If he were to do the same work, he might need to use a workshop's ultra-microscopic equipment and endure several months of painstaking effort to carefully complete such a fine process, stripping away those unrelated structures, and even then, he couldn't be certain of the outcome and effectiveness.

How could it be so fast?

It was like precise demolition, blowing away everything above and below the eighth floor of a building while ensuring that when the eighth floor landed, not a single leaf of a potted plant fell off and the water and electricity continued to run as normal.

Within this miniscule range, requiring a microscope to observe, the target was entirely destroyed and stripped away, leaving the rest unharmed.

"Consider it, my secret technique."

Ye Xian rarely smiled, "Separating impurities, erasing properties, dissecting structures—based on my experience, through special manipulations and methods, freely dissociating and reconstructing the alchemy structure within an item.

It was with this that I passed the Redification Assessment of the Taiyi Ring.

Its registered name is 'Dissociation Technique.'

Want to learn it?"

Ji Jue nodded furiously, his eyes shining like lightbulbs.

With such a groundbreaking technique laid out before him, if he didn't wag his tail and fawn a bit, he might go home and sleep, only to wake up giving himself several slaps with a Little Pearl for pretending to be a tough guy!

Any hesitation at this point would be disrespectful to his own intelligence and the professor's favor.

Thinking of that warehouse full of junk, with this technique in hand, would he still worry about not having enough dog food in the future?! Would there even be a need to painstakingly overload his Spirituality and cause his own breakdown, wouldn't he just be flaunting extravagantly, showing off as much as he wants?

Perhaps even more exaggerated… when encountering someone like Mr. Lou, a Federation coin warrior armed to the teeth, wouldn't he be able to extend a sinful hand directly?

"Very good."

Ye Xian nodded, her expression returning to serious, "I've been busy with another project recently and can't afford the time, I need you to do something for me."

Where to go? Whom to kill? How many?

Seeing the golden exclamation mark rising above Professor Ye's head, Ji Jue could hardly contain himself, if he didn't burst the confirm button right now, would he still be human?

"To be precise, go to a place and fetch something back for me."

Professor Ye added, "The location is just outside Cliff City, a Crack Realm entrance that will soon emerge in this world."

The first half of the statement froze Ji Jue's smile on his face, unsure whether to laugh or cry. But at the second half, he no longer cared about losing Little Pearls.

"The item you need to bring back is a Matrix."

Professor Ye said slowly, "A Matrix that might as well have been tailor-made for you."

"Its name is 'Non-attack'."

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